CATHARSIS
from the Best of Banes Collection
A writing instructor once gave me brief advice on how to write a story, structurally speaking. It was 1/4 Act One setup, 1/2 Act Two complications and rising stakes (I think), and about 1/4 An Act Three “cathartic ending”.
I ...
The Comedy Plot, Toolbox Edition (part two)
Banes at 12:00AM, May 18, 2017Welcome to part two of a twenty-seven part series about outlining simple comedy plots!
Who is the Hero
What Does the Hero Want?
The Door Opens
The Hero Takes Control
So last week we went over the first two items. A particular character who wants something on a surface level ...
Archetypal Motifs (Carl Jung, part 2): Apocalypse
Tantz_Aerine at 12:00AM, April 29, 2017
Starting with Jung’s archetypal motifs, I think it’s best to remind why they’re called ‘archetypal’ first:
Archetypal motifs replicate themselves in stories across time and culture, in all human endeavors to create.
Motifs in general are tokens in a story that appear several times and symbolize something ...
Them's the rules, bub.
HyenaHell at 12:00AM, March 3, 2017
Well last week we had chaos and disruption, so reckon it's high time we reestablished some order around here. And to do that ya need rules, right?
Rules. Yeah… Oh boy.
Well fine, we ain't got to call it “rules”; we can think of it as a set ...
A river in Egypt
Banes at 12:00AM, Feb. 23, 2017
A character will stay stuck in their ways if they can, just like a real person tends to. It takes effort to move forward and achieve things. And we resist.
In the beginning of a story, a character might feel comfortable where they are, but they are usually incomplete in ...
Stuck In The Middle
Banes at 12:00AM, Nov. 17, 2016
Stuck in the Middle - Midpoints
I've often found the Midpoint of a story difficult to find and difficult to write.
It's one of the big three pillars in story structure, and it's the
most subtle.
The Midpoint doesn't have the “dragged into a new world” of ...
Getting to the Point
HippieVan at 12:00AM, Sept. 23, 2016
So, I tend to be long-winded. The mark of a historian, probably, or I maybe I just love to hear myself talk. But rarely does that become so evident to me as when I’m turning my comic script into actual comic pages. Suddenly what seemed like a brief remark ...